Archive for the ‘General’ Category

Back in 1978, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg sat down to brainstorm out the script for Raiders of the Lost Ark. The whole process was taped, and those taped have now been transcribed into a PDF. At 90 pages long, it isn’t a short read, but its is an intriguing look into how to the movie script came about, and escpecially for those of us who are writers.

As someone with a bit of a historical bent, I found the following most fascinating.

In 1951, a collection of 3500 glass plate negatives from the nineteenth century were found. Digitally scanned, they can now be viewed and give glimpsed of what life was like back in 1872 and in the Gold Rush towns of Australia.

The timing of finding this is rather intriguing, as there is a project I am working on that touches on aspects of this, and one of the characters just happens to be interested in photography, and would be using similar devices as took these photos.

Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, used private funds to locate then raise the F-1 engines, and hoped they can be displayed at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. He also maintains they remain the property of NASA

It is great to see such an amazing piece of history rediscovered, and also the philanthropic gesture made by Bezos.

It has been some time since I last properly updated the blog and it really is due. So over the coming weeks I plan to give it an overhaul, updating it and also fixing up links, setting up new pages and various other matters like that.

It is all part of the plan to get marketing back on track – it helps to have a more professional look to the blog. And not just to the blog, but various other odds and ends will be fixed up as well.

The vision emerging of the meteor exploding over the central Russian city of Chelyabinsk is rather impressive. When you hear the explosion from the fireball, you can see why hundred were injured when windows were shattered. It is also a reminder of why we shouldn’t be ignoring space. Sadly with budgets for space exploration and research being slashed, the chances of picking up one of these coming in lessens. If it had been just a bit bigger and hit the ground, then attitudes might change.

You can see why there might have been a lot of injuries from flying glass. The bright flashes would have attracted people to the windows and then the explosion would have broke the glass.